Life After Bellamy: Erik Braeden Lewis (Ph.D. 2023)

I sit down to write this and realize that since I graduated in May 2023, my life has been a whirlwind of experiences, and it looks so different than it did back then. This week is particularly busy with grading and fundraising and committee meetings and everything else that life throws at you, but that’s not what feels so different.

When I first graduated, Florida State University was very generous in allowing me to stay around, bother everybody, and adjunct a few classes while I figured out my life. I worked as an adjunct for two sections in the summer and one in the fall, getting valuable teaching experience for U.S. History Part II, which supplemented the European and Middle Eastern history courses that I had taught as a Ph.D. candidate. This experience proved to be invaluable. After being on the job market for slightly over two years (as I started applying long before I finally graduated, and continued doing so after), I had decided that this was my final cycle of applications. I was either going to land a tenure-track job by the end of the academic year, or I was going to leave academia. This was a tough decision to make, especially since I had managed to land a few first-round interviews and one second-round interview, ultimately coming up short every time.

In this final cycle, I applied to Doña Ana Community College for a tenure-track position teaching history. I received an email from the college, and to my surprise learned that I had been selected for a first-round interview. This went extremely well, and within a short time, I heard back from them asking for a second-round interview. This was going to be with administration as well as faculty, and it included a teaching demonstration on the Enlightenment. Because of my training in French literature and history, this was right up my alley and boosted my confidence, in turn permitting me to give the lecture of a lifetime.

Only a couple of days after my teaching demonstration, I heard from Dr. Blaufarb that he had been contacted to follow up on his letter of recommendation and that he felt very confident that this time it would end better for me. He was right! They called within a week to offer me the job, but by this time it was already December, and the college had one condition: the position started in January. I accepted the job, but then came the crazy part. Not only did I have to say goodbye to my FSU family and Tallahassee friends, I had only four weeks to pack up my life, move half way across the country, find a place to live, and start the job that I had dreamed about having for so many years.

I put everything I owned into a POD, drove to Las Cruces, New Mexico, and started my new life after Bellamy. So, what is the gig? I am a tenure-track Instructor of History. I teach U.S. History, World History, and Western Civilization survey courses, and I am also teaching a Gender Studies course on women’s rights and activism in different cultures around the world. My teaching load looks like six courses in the fall, six in the spring, and one in the summer. That sounds like quite a bit, but each class is capped at 24 students, and teaching is my main responsibility. I am also the Faculty Advisor for the Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society, and I do service work on two committees. What is wildly different about working at a community college is that research is not part of my job. I am allowed to research, and I get credit for presentations and publications, but tenure at my institution is largely based on teaching, not on research output. Don’t fret! I still get to go to conferences, and I am still active in my research, just not as active as I was as a Ph.D. candidate.

The adjustment that came with becoming a tenure-track instructor is wild. FSU did such a great job providing the opportunities to get in-class teaching experience as the instructor of record. But doing this for one class, while handling one research project, is vastly different from doing this for six different classes at a time, while also dealing with committee service, advising, and research. I really had to buckle down and focus on maintaining for six classes the same level of rigor and output as I was producing for the one class I had taught at FSU.

But let’s be real: I know I am one of the lucky ones. Tenure-track jobs in history are not easy to land. What a privilege it is for me to have this job and live this life. Moreover, my partner was able to find a job working for the New Mexico Department of Health, so he was able to move here with me. I was initially so scared after graduation: I had not yet found permanent work and school was literally all I had known my entire life. The future was so unknown. As always, though, I ended up where I am supposed to be. I feel like I am in a position where I can make a difference in the lives of my students, and that is probably the most rewarding part of all of this.

The history Ph.D. program at FSU, the Institute on Napoleon and the French Revolution, the research and teaching opportunities, the wonderful faculty and staff, my colleagues and peers with whom I grew close along the way, and all of the life centered around Bellamy, these are the things that made my time in Tallahassee absolutely amazing. Without a doubt, this was one of the best times of my life, and I thank you all for being a part of that experience.